The Lottery

In Shirley Jackson's, "The Lottery," one theme is Man's ability (and need) to rationalize generally unacceptable actions. The most common means Jackson uses to illustrate this idea is through her employment of tradition in the story. Perhaps the lottery in the village was necessitated in the beginning for the sake of population control, or something along those lines; however, as time passed each year the lottery continued, and each year more details to its origins were lost.  “Because so much of the ritual had been forgotten or discarded…” Jackson wrote about the ceremony, “…years and years ago…part[s] of the ritual had been allowed to lapse,” yet, because it was tradition, the villagers persisted in their ways. Not even the decrepit black box could be changed because even though there had been discussion on building a new box, the villagers objected because, “…no one wanted to upset even as much as tradition was represented by [it].” It quickly becomes apparent that while the act of the lottery is wrong and frightening—there is some evidence that the villagers fear it each year, talking in hushed tones and hardly laughing at jokes—they continue regardless, because that’s what tradition dictates. Those who object to the practice, like the north village that has entirely stopped, are deemed crazy and too young and immature to understand the importance of such ideas. People like Old Man Warner are especially vulnerable to this response, having grown up with it for 77 years and never once falling victim to it. Because the majority of the community is not impacted by the single yearly death, they have no personal drive to stop it. Probability states it won’t be them who are chosen. This changed when they are the one being stoned as Tessie Hutchison illustrated. She was begging for a second chance, after being so nonchalant about the tradition previously. Because the community members don’t feel empathy, especially since they have been participating in this act like it’s a normal exciting thing, since they were children, they don’t see what’s so horrific about the event, and if they do, they are too afraid of change to act on it.

     Much of the story reminded me of religious tradition. On a smaller level I was reminded of Christmas and Easter. Neither holiday is based solely in Christianity and both have morphed incredibly over the years to form something entirely different than their origins, yet each year the majority of Americans celebrate both—some in a very religious matter—with little regard to the way they have been shaped. On a more intense note, it reminded me of the current struggles of the LGBT community in religion. Many of the people of the older crowd—the real Old Man Warens--are claiming gay practices and relations to be wrong, while the younger crowd—like those in the story—see differently. As a young person you are crazy if you buy into the idea of equal rights for the LGBT community, even though those in the communities in many states could lose their job, housing, education, etc. among other persecutions, merely for their sexuality, much like in the story one person could die merely from the bad luck of drawing the dot. This is justified through religious tradition preaching that it’s okay to act like this way because of someone’s sexuality.
     In both real life and in “The Lottery”, tradition is used as a justification of harmful actions.